David Wagner, Regent University School of Law:

"ACLU Files Suit in Pa. Over Evolution… The state American Civil Liberties Union plans to file a federal lawsuit Tuesday against a Pennsylvania school district that is requiring students to learn about alternatives to the theory of evolution. The ACLU said its lawsuit will be the first to challenge whether public schools should teach "intelligent design," which holds that the universe is so complex that it must have been created by some higher power….." [continuation].

Amazing. This is not a Scopes-type case, where the government prosecutes a teacher who taught a disfavored theory. Here, the government itself (the school board) is coming to the aid of a disfavored theory, and in so doing, is in effect broadening the intellectual options presented to students. The ACLU is suing to prevent this. When the subject at hand is that of human origins, the ACLU's take is that the First Amendment requires suppression of competing theories. It's trying to do exactly what Justice Douglas, reinventing Pierce in his Griswold opinion, called "contract[ing] the spectrum of available knowledge." [December 14, 2004; Ninomania has the full post]